Until the parliamentary elections of 2018, which are expected to end with the extension of the Socialists in Parliament and doubts about the durability of the European course, the new Head of the EU Delegation should confront the political maneuvers of the Democrats, expert in political sciences Dionis Cenusa writes in an analysis article for IPN Agency.
The politologist considers there will be a painful process of communication with the extraparliamentary opposition, which, even if it expressed its satisfaction with the first conversation with Peter Michalko, will react negatively if the macro-financial assistance is ultimately initiated.
The closest challenge is related to the macro-financial assistance and its political impact on the political narrative in Chisinau.
Dionis Cenusa describes three main scenarios concerning the macro-financial assistance.
According to the first scenario, the EU will provide the assistance, arguing that the government followed particular recommendations of the Venice Commission concerning the mixed-member electoral system, abandoned the reviewed law on noncommercial organizations that could limit foreign financing or other arguments provided by the Democrats. The given scenario is positive for the government, but negative for the extraparliamentary opposition whose criticism against the mixed-member system will be undermined.
The second scenario consists of an attempt by the EU to tie the government to new commitments and the conditionality stipulated in the agreement on the macro-financial assistance. The Europeans can use the assistance as leverage for making the Moldovan authorities to ensure the functioning of the democratic institutions in an electoral year - 2018. The disadvantage of this scenario is that any freezing of assistance will be exploited by President Dodon and the Socialists to unite their voters.
Under the third scenario, which is the most probable one, assistance will not be provided for the reason that the multi-party system was affected by the introduction of the mixed electoral system and the competition between political forces in the election process was distorted. Thus, the EU could become the target of accusations on the part of pro-governmental media outlets for “penalizing” the government and, simultaneously, depriving the country of vital financial assistance.
